Tuesday, September 4, 2007

PRE-SEASON PRESS RELEASE

Respectfully, throughout its 86-year history, Piedmont High School football teams have been labeled as “undersized, overachievers, hardworking, gritty, creative and smart.” Piedmont is a public high school, participating in the CIF – North Coast Section 2A Classification with a coed enrollment of just over 900 students. And now, the Highlanders will try to keep their spirited football tradition alive by implementing a brand new offense on September 7th, @ 7:00PM in their opening game at Campolindo High School in Moraga, CA.

The Highlanders’ new system is called, “The A-11 Offense” which stands for (All Eleven Potentially Eligible), and it’s a unique offensive system never before seen in the history of football.

“Necessity gives birth to invention,” says Piedmont Head Football Coach, Kurt Bryan, a twenty-two year coaching veteran at the high school and collegiate levels.” And Bryan explains, “We are a very small school regularly competing against teams drawing quality athletes from schools nearly twice our enrollment, so we had to try and create a system that somewhat negated sheer brute strength and size from the offensive side of the ball.”

Exactly, what is the A-11 Offense and how did it come to be?

“The A-11 Offense utilizes offensive principles from other systems such as, the spread, triple option, west coast and traditional I formation schemes.” However, there is one major difference between the A-11 and every other offense: in the A-11, all of the offensive players on the field will be wearing eligible receiver numbers. The players’ jerseys will display either # 1 – 49 or 80 – 99; therefore traditional Offensive Lineman numbered 50 – 79 will not necessarily be on the field during the A-11, although they will be used as well, dependent upon the situation and formation.

“It took us more than a year to develop the A-11 and get it approved,” said Bryan. “We are well within the rules of the game. The feedback from other coaches, our players and the officials has been great. It is the next step in the evolution of the game. Our Director of Football Operations & OL/DL Coach, Steve Humphries, and the entire coaching staff have worked hard to create this system.” Says Humphries, “We are excited to see what happens and hopeful it allows us to be more competitive on a weekly basis. It should be fun to watch, there will be a lot of speed on the field and we believe the A-11 will help our cause. It is worth the investment for our kids and the program.”

For more about Piedmont’s A-11 Offense and the Highlander football program, please visit www.piedmontfootball.com and pick a game to watch them play. It should be interesting.